


Close To Metal

by AutisticConnor



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Autistic Connor, Canon-Typical Violence, I'll update tags as I go, Infamous Second Son Au, because I am a poor planner, but i can definitely tell you it won't be hank/connor, there's gonna be some ships but i'm not sure which ones so they aren't quite there yet
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-19
Updated: 2018-07-31
Packaged: 2019-06-12 17:48:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15345204
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AutisticConnor/pseuds/AutisticConnor
Summary: Years ago, a small group of humans called "Conduits" emerged--each with the ability to manipulate and even weaponize a unique form of matter. The Department of Unified Protection was formed to hunt down and indefinitely detain all Conduits (reclassified as "Bio-Terrorists") to protect the population.Recently, there has been an outcry for rights for this group of people, resulting in increased activity from the D.U.P. While a large number of Bio-Terrorists have been captured and put into Curdun Cay prison, many are being grabbed from the streets, running and hiding in a desperate attempt to save their lives.The country is on the verge of a revolution"





	1. Hostage

Elevators were an experience for Connor.

He could feel the shifting metal resonating up his legs and into his chest. He watched the numbers above the doors slowly count up to the penthouse floor. This was Connor’s first mission outside Curdun Cay, first time being allowed to interact with the outside world. It was a bit intimidating.

The smooth texture of the coin rolling over his knuckles was comforting. Connor wished he had something to chew on, but he didn’t want to ruin the quarter for later use. The rumbling in his chest started slowing until it came to a complete stop. The doors slid open.

“The D.U.P agent is onsite,” A nearby S.W.A.T officer said into a radio.

Connor studied the surroundings. The apartment was rather lavish, though that was to be expected of someone able to afford the penthouse. An aquarium lined one of the walls, various species of fish floating peacefully inside.

One lay on the ground, flopping around in an impossible attempt to get back inside the tank. He knelt down and scooped it up.

Connor stared at the fish wriggling feebly in his hand. It was colorful, probably tropical. And helpless. Its body could be easily crushed by a human, never mind a bio-terrorist like himself. If Connor really wanted to he could reduce the scaly creature to a small pile of ashes.

He didn't. He straightened his back, gently dropping the fish back into the nearby tank. It twisted around briefly before finally straightening itself out and joining its brethren in their monotonous lifestyle. Connor could almost relate.

A heart-piercing wail broke through the air, something latching onto his jacket sleeve and pulling. Connor humored the weak attempt and turned around to come eye to eye with a sobbing middle aged woman.

“You stay away from her!” She screeched as a S.W.A.T officer started to escort her away. “I saw your jacket! I know what you are! _Stay away from my little girl_!”

She disappeared into the elevator, screaming the whole way. Connor fixed his collar. The design on the back of his jacket almost felt like it was burning into his spine, but there was no time contemplate that. He had work to do. 

When he'd been sent here, he was told that Captain Allen would be the leader of the operation, so he might have information Connor could use. He scanned over the apartment. Most units were stationed at the windows with their guns drawn, but there were two men in the back room looking at a computer. That seemed promising.

“Captain Allen?” Connor called as he approached. One turned his head just enough to get a view of Connor in the corner of his eye, then returned his attention back to the computer screen. 

“Who're you?”

“I'm the specialized bio-terrorist unit sent by the Department of Unified Protection.”

“Ah yes. The D.U.P’s little experiment.” Captain Allen’s tone didn't seem all that fond. “What do you want?”

“What powers does the bio-terrorist have?”

Allen waved a hand flippantly. “I don't know. Something with floating.”

“That could describe a number of known bio-terrorist power types.” Connor frowned. “I need information to determine the best approach to not endanger either party so-”

“Listen.” Captain Allen turned to face Connor fully. “I don't care what you do as long as you don't hurt the hostage or my men. Blast a hole in his chest for all I care. You things are barely human.”

A quip about how uncooperative Allen was being was on the tip of Connor's tongue, but if his pattern recognition was anything to go by, people didn't like it when someone of Connor's nature talked back to them. He'd just have to get information himself.

Connor stepped back into the main room. He just needed… Ah. There was a television on one side of the room. That would do just fine.

He clicked it on, startling the S.W.A.T members nearby. “What the fuck are you doing?!”

“Forgive me, I need to change my skill set a bit.” 

Connor felt them staring as he held his hand towards the television, images blurring as blue, pixelated light channeled from the screen and up his arm before winking out. He flexed his fingers against the familiar staicy feeling that the Video power always briefly supplied. 

He waved his hand, a pulse of blue flashing out from his feet to sweep over the entire room. A hard light reconstruction might be useful. If his scan was right…

A figure appeared a few feet away from the body next to the table. John Phillips, if Connor recognized him correctly from the file he had been supplied. The figure blinked in and out of focus like a lightbulb on its last legs.

“What the hell is that?” The nearest officer hissed.

“A hard light construct. Please don’t touch it, they’re delicate.” Connor glanced at the position the body had fallen in, adjusting the construction to match the most likely pose he’d had before falling. “Are there any cameras in the apartment? If I can interface with them I should be able to make a full three dimensional reconstruction that’s far more accurate than guesswork.”

“Nope. You’re one your own.”

Oh, good, he loved inaccurate data. Connor glanced at the body again. He was shot from the front, one clean shot right through his chest. And judging by how his arms had fallen…

“He was holding something.” Connor said. He placed his hand on the construction’s chest and pushed, watching the way its arms moved before it hit the floor and shattered into specs of blue.

He knelt down and looked under the table. A cell phone lay on the floor, screen cracked. Connor picked it up and ran a quick scan with his powers. The last number in the “recents” list was the D.U.P hotline, ended after just one second.

John was trying to turn the bio-terrorist in.

Connor set the phone on the table top. Phillips had been facing the hostage’s room, so Connor assumed that’s where the bio-terrorist had been. 

The first thing Connor noticed about the room was purple. There was a lot of purple in the room. He picked up the tablet on the desk scattered with doodles of stick figures. Connor unlocked it, and a video of Emma, the hostage, and a blonde man around Connor’s age started playing.

_“This is Daniel, the coolest brother in the world! Say hi Daniel!”_

_“Hello!”_

_“He’s visiting for a whole three weeks.”_

_“Because I’m such a good family m-”_

The video cut short. It appeared like Emma had dropped the tablet during filming. Looking to the camera roll, it appeared there was another video. Connor frowned, pressing the play button. The screen was dark, the audio muffled, like the tablet had been lying face down on something.

_“You can’t tell mom and dad about this, okay? I’ll get in trouble.”_ Connor recognized the voice as Daniel’s.

_“I know.”_ That would be Emma.

_“I don’t want you to get mixed up in something like this. It’ll be our secret, okay?”_

_“Okay!”_

The video stopped. Connor glanced back to the desk. There were crude stick figure renditions of Emma and Daniel floating, and Connor had a feeling that wasn’t just a little girl’s imagination.

He set the tablet back down and exited the room. There was a possibility that he might be able to glean more information from the body of the first responder, but his chances of success were dwindling every moment that passed. It might just be best to go straight out. 

On his way to the window, Connor grabbed the pot sitting on the kitchen counter, the static of Video being replaced with cold Metal. He peeked out at the roof. Sure enough, Daniel from the video was standing on the edge of the building, arm raised as Emma floated a good three feet of the ground next to him. From the lack of visible energy, it was a good bet that he had air manipulation powers. 

He slipped out of the door, something blasting into his left arm. Connor glanced down. It was a rather small wound, his fast healing would soon heal it over completely. Interesting, he could ionize air into plasma

“Hello!” Connor called out across the roof. “My name is Connor!”

“Go away! Get everyone away!”

He held up his hand, allowing it to light up in an orangish glow. “It's okay. I'm a Conduit like you.”

The bio-terrorist’s hand faltered just slightly at the word “Conduit”. A good sign. “You look like you're wearing clothes from the D.U.P.”

Connor was going to have to get closer if he needed to make a grab for the little girl. He'd need to keep calm language. “I am from the D.U.P, but I'm not a foot soldier. I won't try to kill you, I just want to talk.”

“My… My name is Daniel.” He trusted Connor, even just a little bit. 

“They were going to turn you in, and you became upset, right?” Connor caught sight of a police officer laying a short distance away. That would require immediate attention.

“I'm their _son_!” Daniel yelled. “Their own child and they were going to turn me in for just playing with my little sister!”

Connor glanced at Daniel as he knelt down next to the wounded officer. There was a rather large bullet wound in his arm. He could die of blood loss or an infection, but it was nothing Connor's powers couldn't handle. 

“What are you doing?” Daniel called.

“This man is injured. I'm going to heal him so he won't bleed out.”

“He tried to hurt me!”

“He won’t. I’ll make sure no one will hurt you.”

Daniel watched suspiciously as Connor held a hand over the officer, orange light returning again. Healing others was one of the few bio-terrorist abilities yet to be explained, but it came in handy. He stood back up and looked to Daniel. The bio-terrorist had lowered Emma just slightly, just enough to be noticable. That was good.

“Listen, I know this isn’t your fault.” Connor started stepping closer and closer to him. Fast enough to be obvious, but slow enough to be non-threatening. “You were just protecting yourself. You didn’t want to kill him.”

“It’s… It’s not my fault. He was my family, I…” The defenses that had been dropping were suddenly thrown back up. “I didn’t matter as soon as he knew! He knows what they do to Conduits and he still tried to turn me in!”

By now he was standing just a few feet from Daniel. At this distance Connor could grab Emma, but Daniel would probably attempt some sort of retaliation that he may or may not be able to counter. Connor had orders to bring in bio-terrorists alive. He shouldn’t risk it.

“You have to trust me, Daniel. Let the hostage go, and everything will be fine.”

Daniel chewed on his lip, grabbing Emma as he set her down from midair. “I want everyone to leave. When I’m outside the city I’ll let her go.” 

“That’s impossible. If you let her go, I _promise_ you won’t get hurt.”

“...I don’t want to go to Curdun Cay.”

“You won’t. We’re just going to talk.” 

Daniel nodded slowly. “Okay. I trust you.” He let Emma go, the girl immediately scrambling away. Connor smiled and held out a hand.

A loud _bang!_ Interrupted the silence, along with Emma’s high pitched scream. A new hole appeared in Daniel’s left side, already filthy shirt now irreversibly ruined with blood. 

“What are you doing?!” Connor yelled. Another gunshot, but it was too late. Daniel had tipped off the edge of the building, the bullet burying itself in the metal of the railing. That one would have hit his head.

Connor ran forward and jumped off the roof with no hesitation. Bio-terrorists had enhanced durability that let them survive essentially any fall, but there was no way Daniel would live through a descent this height if he also had a sizable part of his abdomen mangled. 

But he was gone. As Connor fell, there was no sign of Daniel either. He cursed softly under his breath. Connor landed easily at the bottom, startling quite a few officers who had been guarding the door. There was no body down here either. He looked back up to the top of the building. The hostage was rescued, so his mission was accomplished, but the D.U.P would definitely not be happy about this.


	2. Opening

Deep breath in, deep breath out. Deep breath in, hold for four seconds, exhale for eight seconds. Hold for four, exhale for eight. Kara opened her eyes and stared into her bathroom mirror. One more day. One more day of hiding and then they’d all be free.

It was a ridiculous thought, but then again, it was just supposed to help Kara get through the motions.

She gathered her hair up, twisting it into a bun and pushing in the pins to keep it up. It was too far to the right. Kara adjusted it accordingly. Less than perfect meant stress, stress meant questions, questions meant possible discoveries, and discovery meant being sent straight to Curdun Cay. It was a fine line that she walked.

Kara touched up with some makeup, not anything obvious, just enough to cover the signs of mild sleep deprivation. Her schedule for today featured her least favorite house to clean. Some sleaze named Todd Williams, who never even _tried_ to keep the house tidy when Kara was done. His daughter was sweet enough. Very quiet, though.

She left the bathroom and grabbed her keys from the table. Deep breath, hold for four, out for eight. One more day.

Just one more day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's a reason this chapter is so short but i don't know if I achieved what I wanted to accomplish with that? Whatever, it's happened, and you guys are gonna get a fuck ton of action for the next Kara chapter.
> 
> Comments allow me to live another day!
> 
> Ask me questions about this or any of my aus/stories on my tumblr @autistic-connor


	3. Shades of Color

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> World note: Since technology isn’t quite as advanced as in the D:BH game; Carl’s house is one story so he can have better mobility. Sorry, Carl’s zoomy stair lift.

Walking the streets had become a safety risk. The D.U.P had started the spill into the city, setting up checkpoints and towers, rounding people into suspicion pens. It was scary to step outside and buy art supplies. 

Markus slipped through the alleyway, hugging the bag full of art supplies to his chest. Recently, he'd had to change his usual routes to avoid those checkpoints. Markus wasn't a bio-terrorist, but he didn't want to be around if one of them did stop by. Or worse, if he got a false positive and got thrown into a cage. The thought alone made him shudder. 

With that fire bio-terrorist tearing across the city and leaving a trail of bodies in their wake, going outside in general was much more dangerous. The public had been advised not to go out unless absolutely necessary when there had been reports of nearby activity, but this trip was special. Markus had to get this, bio-terrorist or not. 

He rounded the corner. As he caught sight of the bus stop just down the road, a ball of tension in Markus's chest unraveled. He was almost out of all the danger of the streets, bio-terrorist and D.U.P alike. All he had to do was-

Oh.

Markus halted. A group of people Markus had originally assumed to be loiterers were gathered around a man lying on the ground, bound up in one of those yellow vests the D.U.P slapped onto suspected bio-terrorists. They were taking turns kicking him, faces a mixture of disgust and sadistic joy. This wasn't the first time Markus had seen something like this. It was an unspoken rule. If somehow a bio-terrorist slipped between the D.U.P’s fingers during transport, you didn’t interrupt people taking justice. Participation wasn’t necessary, but bio-terrorists were monsters. Potential killers.

It was best to just keep walking. To not get mixed up. Markus kept his eyes averted, head down low as he walked past. That was why he took detours around the checkpoints, to avoid getting involved. The bus stop was _right there_. It would be so easy to just keep going and get home. Just like all the other times. 

Each step sent a jolt of Markus’s legs. Guilt, maybe, or fear. The pleads for help from the man on the ground wasn’t helping. He’d have to understand, right? If Markus stepped in he might get hurt too. This was the easiest way to prevent pain for the most people. But… Markus stopped once again, only a few stops from the bus stop.

God dammit, Carl was getting to him.

He swiveled on his heels. “Hey!”

One of the men in the group looked towards Markus. “What?” He gestured vaguely to the bio-terrorist. “Do you want to get in on the action?”

“No, I want you to stop.” Words of a poet, truly.

The rest had turned their gaze to Markus. This was perhaps the worst idea that Markus would ever come up with. On the bright side, he was _truly_ terrifying holding his armful of paints and brushes. Unlikely, but Markus could hope.

“Why should we?”

Oh good, they’d reached a point that Markus hadn’t quite planned past at record speed. 

“He hasn’t done anything. Law enforcement should handle this.” He used his steadiest, most confident voice. “You’re obstructing justice. You can be punished for this.” Markus definitely didn’t know law well enough to know if that was the case, but with any luck, no one here knew enough either to see through his bluff.

The mumbling and shuffling in the small group seemed to be a good sign. The first guy threw up his hands and nudged his friends. “Fine. You can call the police or whatever.” One of them shoulder checked Markus into a nearby puddle from the earlier rain, splashing muddy water all over him.

Markus waited until they were far away to kneel next to the bio-terrorist. “Are you alright?”

“Y-Yes.” He braced himself against the wall, glancing at Markus with a wary look in his eyes. “Why did you help me?”

Markus blinked a few times. “No one deserves to be treated like that.” A period of awkward silence settled between them. Markus cleared his throat. “I, uh, can’t really help you with that vest.”

“Yea, yea, I totally get it. I’ll just…” The bio-terrorist started slowly backing away, hands up non threateningly until he disappeared into the alley.

Markus sighed, making his way back to the bus stop. At least those people hadn’t tried to pick a fight with Markus. As toxic as paint thinner is, it wasn’t the world’s best weapon. Maybe he should start taking self defense classes, given the current atmosphere in the city.

He climbed inside of the bus when it pulled up, forcing himself not to look at the ads displaying the D.U.P hotline number. He just hoped helping that bio-terrorist wasn’t the wrong move.

* * *

“Carl, I’m home!” He called, kicking the door shut behind him. “Sorry about stepping out, I just wanted to grab some stuff from the art store.” No response. “Carl?” More silence. Most likely sleeping. 

Markus set the bag on the nearby credenza and walked down the hall to Carl’s room. He opened the curtains, allowing golden light to filter in. “Rise and shine, Carl!”

“Ugh, give me a few more minutes,” Carl groaned from bed.

“Come on, it’s the middle of the afternoon.” Markus sat on the edge of the mattress. “I got you a surprise.”

Carl smiled. “I do like surprises.”

“I saw a craft store offering Penthel brushes. I know they’re your favorite, and since they went out of business I thought I’d step out and get them for you.”

The relaxed expression melted away. “Markus, I appreciate that, but it’s basically martial law out there with the D.U.P around. I don’t want you getting thrown into a cell.”

“It’s the least I could do since you’re letting me stay here.”

“Because you’re my _caretaker_ and I’m paying you to do that.”

Markus waved his hand. “It’s okay. I avoid the checkpoints anyways.”

“And that’s why you’re covered in mud?”

He looked down at the brown muck splattered across his clothes. “I… There was a group of people harassing a suspected bio-terrorist. One just happened to push me into a puddle.”

“Conduits, Markus,” Carl corrected. “They’re called Conduits.” He paused. “I thought that you said they were dangerous.”

“Yea well, some old activist got to me.” Markus stood up. “I’ll get changed and make you breakfast. Does thirty minutes sound good?”

“Sounds great.” 

Carl caught Markus’s hand as he started to turn away. “Wait.”

“Yes, Carl?”

“You don’t have to do that again. I don’t want you to get hurt out there.”

Markus smiled, patting Carl’s hand. “I won’t.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woo, we're just about to get out of the set up chapters thank fucking god. Sorry that a lot of this just seems like a retelling, I gotta get everything Ready and Prepared
> 
> Comments sustain me
> 
> If you have any questions come over to my tumblr @ autistic-connor !

**Author's Note:**

> Okay so! Maybe I'm putting too much work on myself! But here's this! If anyone who hasn't played the game needs explanations, please ask and I'll give them in the comments! Or just go to my tumblr @ autistic-connor ! I didn't explain it very well (or at all really, lol) but the back of connor's jacket says "warning: d.u.p bio-terrorist"
> 
> Comments allow me to live another day


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